PROCEEDINGS OP THE COTTESWOLD CLUB 163 



through Uvo interpreters. Our Russian attendant gather- 

 ing my meaning in EngUsh, passed it on to a Persian, 

 who turned it into " Aderbijansky," as it is here called ; 

 that is, the dialect of Turkish or Tartar spoken through- 

 out the Persian Province of Aderbijan, and largely used 

 by Armenians and Tartars in the Caucasus. It is to 

 Western Central Asia what French is in European travel- 

 ling : a general medium of intercourse. 



Nikola seized the idea at once, and searching among his 

 stock brought out the pattern of pick I wanted, as well as 

 two others used in dressing stone by the Persians. One 

 was a hammer with tW'O perpendicular edges cut into teeth 

 about a quarter of an inch long ; the other shewed a flat 

 of 2" square, cut with deep v grooves at right-angles, so 

 as to leave the whole surface covered with sharp points a 

 quarter of an inch asunder. Both these forms are used 

 in England for granite. 



Selecting a piece of steel, the smith placed it in the fire 

 and signalled to his boy — an Armenian — to blow. The 

 hearth was a low square block of masonry in the middle 

 of the shop. The bellows, which stood at the back of it, 

 consisted of two pig-skins, or calf-skins, placed perpen- 

 dicularly on the ground, with a board between them, and 

 two others on the sides with handles. The boy grasped 

 one in each hand — his arms being wide apart, and began 

 to sway himself from side to side two or three feet left 

 and right alternately, so that as one skin was emptied the 

 other was filled, keeping up a strong continuous blast. 

 Here was clearly the origin of the term " a pair " of 

 bellows : the word bellows itself probably being from 

 Pellis, a skin, of which the Saxon form is Fell (as in 

 Fellmonger). 



I was struck as I watched the Greek skilfully hammer- 

 ing the dazzling hot steel to its shape, by noting how 

 without any gauge or template he wrought it not only to 

 the form we still use in Europe, but drew its point to 



